The Ban on Tik-Tok

Commentary by Daniel Shuler. Photo by FE Pocket Booster.

January 18, 2025, was a day filled with anxiety for many Americans. You might be wondering why. This was the day a ban on TikTok in the US was set to take effect, and the thought of living in a TikTok-less world left many Americans devastated. 

Tik-Tok is a social media platform where you can create and share creative videos. The app is from mainland China and Hong Kong, and is owned by Chinese internet technology company ByteDance, which was founded in 2012. This app is important to many users because of its wide range of abilities. Some use it as product promotion, others use it for entertainment purposes and more. In 2014, an app called Musical.ly was created, which hit #1 on the App Store. In 2016, ByteDance launched Douyin for their main Chinese audience, and Tik-Tok for foreign audiences, due to Douyin’s growing popularity. Shortly after, ByteDance bought the rights to Musical.ly in 2018 and merged it with TikTok. 

Trump initially did want to ban Tik-Tok due to the talk of security concerns. After some years, the talk of banning the app arose again and this time, it was officially banned by Trump in 2024. According to CBS News, there were significant concerns regarding national security and data privacy surrounding ByteDance.

Despite Trump being the one who originally advocated for the ban, White House advisers persuaded  him to hold off on banning TikTok outright to prevent possible legal and political repercussions, causing him to reverse it. Following Trump’s reversal, TikTok announced it could once again be accessed by American users. I haven't noticed any substantial changes to the app itself, except that once you delete it, you can't reinstall it. Ultimately, this ban has affected many people, from content creators gaining their income, to small businesses promoting their products and gaining more publicity. 

Daniel Shuler is a freshman at Friendship Collegiate Academy.